Having just crossed the finish line of her speed ascent, Katie Bono eyes the macaroni and cheese her climbing partner, Savannah Cummins, made for her at basecamp. (Savannah Cummins (savannahcummins.com) / Courtesy photo)

Chris Weidner Wicked Gravity

"You don't have to look closely, but the skin on my nose is flaking off," Katie Bono said, about 60 seconds after we met.

She sat across from me at Caffe Sole, her frostbite barely visible. Instead, I noticed bright blue earrings that perfectly matched her large, smiling eyes.

"I was just barely warm enough," she explained. "I got to the summit and thought there was ice stuck on my nose. I tried to pull the ice off and I was like, 'Oh, that is my nose!"

Bono stood alone on the summit of Denali (20,310 feet) on the subzero evening of June 13. "I pulled duct tape out of my bag to stick on my nose," she said. "It's a really good wind barrier."

Hungry and dehydrated, she spent fewer than five minutes on top of North America. After all, she was racing to become the fastest woman to climb Denali round-trip.

Bono (rhymes with "oh no") had already summited "The Great One" twice: first while guiding the West Buttress for Rainier Mountaineering Inc. in 2014, and again in 2015 via the challenging Cassin Ridge.

"I grew up cross-country skiing, so I inherently kind of like the idea of suffering for long periods of time in the cold. It's what I do." Bono laughed.

A passionate skier, she competed in Junior Nationals from 2003-2007 and at the NCAA Championships in 2010. After graduating from Dartmouth in 2010 she raced professionally for a year.

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Despite her success Bono felt dissatisfied — she had burnt out on the one-dimensional lifestyle. "I believe pretty strongly in balance," she told me. Climbing began to consume her "rest days" and she soon abandoned pro racing.

But her need for speed remained.

In 2012 she set the fastest female time on Mount Rainier — a peak she knew intimately from years of guiding.

Bono, 29 and originally from Minneapolis, moved to Boulder in 2015 to establish Colorado residency. She's currently applying to medical schools, with the University of Colorado among her top picks. "I think if I was only a climber, or only focused on intellectual pursuits — not to say climbing isn't intellectual — I think I'd be pretty unhappy," she said.

For Bono it's all about equilibrium — the physical and the cognitive, skiing and climbing, safety and speed.

Like most Denali hopefuls, Bono spent two weeks gradually ascending the 13,100 feet over 17 miles from basecamp (7,200 feet) toward the summit via the West Buttress, allowing her body to adapt to the altitude.

After a short stint at basecamp with her climbing partner, Savannah Cummins, Bono made her first speed attempt. A storm turned her around at 18,100 feet.

Bono and Cummins were then forced to wait at basecamp through nearly a week of rain and snow, all while losing hard-earned acclimatization. "Katie was never negative," said Cummins. "No moment was too grim for her to stop cracking jokes or to keep smiling through the storm."

Finally the forecast offered hope. Bono clicked on her extra-short skis and pointed them uphill.

Roughly halfway up, Bono cached her skis and continued on foot — though not without a critical setback. Her only water bottle, which she had stashed inside her jacket to prevent it from freezing, slipped out and skittered down the ice.

A vertical mile of mountain still loomed above.

She soon passed her friend Jake who gave her half a liter of water. "If he hadn't done that I probably wouldn't have been able to go for it," said Bono. "It was just enough for me to keep going."

Close to the summit she slowed down. "I'd take a step, take three breaths, then take another step. I got to the summit ridge and that's when I felt my nose."

After patching her face with duct tape, Bono started down. The Alaskan sun hung low on the horizon.

At 3:07 a.m. on June 14th, Bono glided into basecamp. Her time of 21 hours, 6 minutes easily set the female speed record; it was the third fastest time ever clocked on Denali.

Balance.

Bono is back in Boulder, her ... ahem ... nose to the grindstone with school applications. As for climbing, Bono said, "I'm really excited to play on rock in a tank top."

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